


never know your story like i do

by 8611



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-25 13:11:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/639240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/8611/pseuds/8611
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim and Bones meet on the first day of kindergarten and grow up together. Along the way there are proposals, musicals, kitchen utensils and a very old Jeep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	never know your story like i do

**Author's Note:**

> I seem to have misplaced the original notes for this one, but this is another repost of my old stuff. High school!AU (well, school!AU in general), and the title is from the Taylor Swift song "You Belong With Me", which also shows up in the fic. The other song that makes an appearance is "Something Pretty" by Patrick Park.
> 
> (side note - I had huge problems extracting the text from the PDF I had of this, so if you see any formatting mistakes, please point them out! I think I got all of them, but who knows, there were a lot.)

Leonard McCoy falls out of the tree in his front yard (it’s an old maple, the bark gnarled and wrinkled) exactly three weeks before the first day of kindergarten. It’s a Wednesday, and his mother makes a royal fuss before whisking him off to his dad’s office. His dad frowns, pronounces “yep, it’s broken” and sends them down the road to the ER. The doctor assures them it’s a clean break, which his dad had already told them, and it’s easy to set and cast.

Of course, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt and itch to the ends of the Earth. Len is quite positive his life sucks, especially when he figures out that he can’t go play with a broken arm, and he has to spend the last three weeks of summer inside while Spock and Nyota and Gaila run around outside. Len decides during that first week that fate is one heck of a cruel mistress.

His mom sends him off to the first day of school with tears in her eyes and a pack of Sharpies so that his friends can sign his cast. Nyota doodles hearts and a lion on his cast, and Spock just simply signs his name before wishing him a fast recovery. Gaila is in the middle of drawing an intricate scene that uses all eight colors and includes a unicorn fighting a T- rex (with back up from a spaceship) when the fourth seat at their table is taken.

The new kid has a mop of blonde hair that gets in his eyes, and his smile is as big as his head. He’s also shorter than everyone, and he looks like a little kid. Bones recognizes him as the kid that just moved in across the street (he’d ended up crashing his tricycle into his mom’s flower beds).

“I’m Jim,” He chirps happily, and Gaila takes to him immediately, letting him help her finish her picture. Len’s about to complain about his shoulder being sore from holding his arm up on the desk for so long when Gaila finishes and the new kid decides he needs to sign it too.

“My arm hurts,” Len whines, but Jim just picks up the blue Sharpie and, in the messiest handwriting Len has ever seen, writes ‘Bones’ on the side of the cast. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You broke ‘em.” Jim grins. “So you’re Bones.”

Len thinks about questioning if there’s any logic behind that particular statement, but stops for fear of sounding like Spock. And, ok, he’s never had a nickname before, so he’s kind of ok with finally having one.

\---

Len decides pretty quickly that the new kid is way more trouble than he’s worth. He’s got eyes the size of dinner plates that also happen to be bright blue, and it gets him out of everything. Len’s mom thinks he’s the cutest thing ever within the week. Len knows better.

When Mrs. Kirk (she tells him to call her Winona) and his mom start having lunch together and talking about the neighborhood, he’s afraid that he might be saddled with this kid for the foreseeable future. He’s not excited.

He’s sitting on the couch one day, curled up watching Spongebob, when his front door bursts open and Gaila and Jim come trotting in, both brandishing Nerf guns. They’d look threatening, but Gaila’s shock of curly red hair makes her just look goofy, and Jim’s too much of a cherub to look truly evil.

However, he is extremely annoyed that they just waltzed, armed, into his house. 

“Hey!” He sits up, holding the remote like a weapon. “What’re you guys doing here?” 

“Surrender, Klingon!” Jim proclaims, angling his gun at Len. “By order of the Federation!” 

“What he said!” Gaila agrees. Len glares.

“Yeah, and who’re you supposed to be?” He crosses his arms. “Captain Loser?”

“I’m Captain Pine, and this is my first officer Mr. Quinto,” Jim says happily. Gaila gives a little wave. 

“You can’t be Quinto, you’re a girl,” Len says petulantly.

“You could join our crew,” Jim suggests helpfully.

“Yeah, you could be Lieutenant Saldana!” Gaila nods, bouncing on her toes. 

“I’m not gonna be a girl!” Len huffs. “And you guys are still in my house!” 

“This isn’t a house, it’s a Klingon Warbird,” Gaila reminds him sweetly.

“Bird-of-Prey.” Jim corrects. Gaila rolls her eyes.

He only agrees to play with them if he doesn’t have to carry a Nerf gun and can be Dr. Urban instead. When Jim is injured by the ferocious Gorn down the street at Mrs. Boon’s house (really Mrs. Boon’s cat, Twinkles) Len makes sure to slap a Band-Aid on the scratch as forcefully as possible.

\---

The first time James T. Kirk ever proposes to Leonard McCoy, it doesn’t go so well.

Jim’s bike goes skidding out from under him when he hits the sidewalk at an awkward angle, sending him spilling onto the sidewalk, knees first. The world flies past him for a second before the concrete stops him rather quickly. He rolls onto his back, biting his bottom lip to try to stop the tears that are welling up in his eyes.

It doesn’t work though, because he can feel himself start to sniffle, and he’s not supposed to cry! He’s too old for that! Babies cry, not first graders.

Bones is suddenly leaning over him, his head blocking the sun, a worried expression on his face.

“You got hurt,” He states, frowning. He rolls Jim up into a sitting position against the low brick wall in front of the house and leans down, poking at Jim’s knee.

“Ow!” Jim nearly kicks Bones when he hits the sluggishly bleeding scrape.

“I can fix that,” Bones states, getting up. “Stay here. You move it and you’ll hurt more.”

Jim just nods, crossing his arms and trying to not start all out bawling, but man, his knee is really painful. Bones is halfway up his walkway when a patch of dandelions in the planter he’s sitting against catches his eyes, and he yanks one out of the ground, rolling the stem around his finger so that it forms a ring. The bright gold flower looks cheery, and he tries to smile, even though it hurts. Bones would like it, he’s sure.

Bones comes running back across the yard a few minutes later, a box of Band-Aids in one hand and some Neosporin in the other.

“Hey, Bones?” Jim asks as Bones rips open one of the Band-Aids (Jim notes that it’s a Spongebob one. He’d rather have a Gary one, and he knows there are Gary ones, because he’s got the same box, but he doesn’t mention this), holding up the dandelion ring. “Will you marry me?”

Bones puts on the Band-Aid before replying, looking confused.

“Look, I even made a ring.” Jim grins, wiping across his eyes with his free hand and sniffing. 

“Jim, I can’t marry you,” Bones says this very seriously.

“Why?” Jim’s face falls.

“Because you’re only six and I’m seven, duh. I’m more mature than you.” Bones rolls his eyes like this is obvious. 

“Oh.” Jim makes to squash the ring, but Bones stops him.

“I’ll wear your ring though.” Bones takes it from him, wedging it onto his thumb. 

“Thanks.” Jim smiles slightly. “Although I wanted a Gary Band-Aid.”

“We’re out.” Bones hands him the box, and Jim looks through it, and sure enough, there are only Spongebob and Mr. Krabs ones left.

Bones helps him stand up, and Jim limps inside behind him, their bikes left forgotten on the sidewalk.

\---

The second time doesn’t go so hot either.

Jim is so totally sure that Jocelyn White is going to be the bane of his young existence. Bones and he don’t have the same teacher this year, so they always eat lunch together and walk home together. It’s just the natural order of things.

Until Jocelyn decided to knock the Earth off its axis and cozy up to Bones. And what’s even worse is that Bones actually likes her back. Jim knows this situation has reached dire levels of a total crisis when he sits down to lunch one day with Spock and asks where Bones is.

Spock just points two tables over. Bones is sitting with Jocelyn. Jim is pretty sure he suddenly knows what all those women are talking about on his mom’s soap operas when they bemoan broken hearts and “Oh, Eduardo! We were so in love!”

He takes his anger out on his sandwich and refuses to swap his apple slices for Spock’s carrot sticks. The rest of the day sucks. And he doesn’t wait for Bones outside school like every other day and instead stomps home, pretending that he’s a T-rex and the sidewalk is quaking under his feet.

It occurs to him some time between the corner of his street and his front door that there is only one solution to this problem. His mom had gotten new cereal last week that came with a Barbie ring inside (she’d apologized, but evidently there weren’t Transformers in Frosted Flakes anymore) and Jim had promised to keep it for Gaila, because her mom never let her get sugary cereal. He’d chucked it on his desk, and had forgotten about it for the whole week.

Now, though, he needs it. He starts digging through the piles of things on his desk the minute he gets home, finding a whole lot of books on space and stars and a few library books that his mom had tried to find a while ago, and hey, there’s his Dodgers hat!

He finds the ring in a pile of rocks that he’d collected last week in case he ever needed them (for what, he’s not quite sure, but it’s always good to be prepared) and holds it up triumphantly. It’s pink and silver, but it’ll have to do.

He races back down the stairs, and out the front door just as his mom is coming in with the groceries, and she looks at him with confusion as he runs out the door with a “Hi mom bye mom I’ve gotta go save Bones from Jocelyn!”

Bones is luckily just shuffling up his front walk when Jim catches up with him.

“Jim!” Bones sticks his finger in Jim’s face before Jim can propose. “You didn’t wait for me, dummy.”

“I had to go get stuff to save you with.” Jim grins. He decides that if he’s going to do this, he better do it right. He drops down on one knee and makes sure to look very serious. “Leonard Horatio McCoy, will you marry me?”

Bones just sort of boggles at him for a minute.

“I can’t marry you!” Bones growls, stomping his foot for emphasis.

“Why not?” Jim just plops down on the walkway, glaring and crossing his arms.

“Because you made me walk home alone and that’s a _girl_ ring. It’s pink.” Bones sticks his tongue out.

“But – but. You like Jocelyn! And she’s got cooties! And you can’t marry her, because she’s not me.” Jim decides that the ground is not the place to have this conversation, and stands back up so that he can actually be closer to Bones’ height.

“She doesn’t have cooties.” Bones rolls his eyes.

“How do you know that?” Jim is starting to get worried now.

“Because I haven’t gotten them yet, duh,” Bones points out. “Now, I’ve got homework to do.”

And that’s that, evidently. Jim decides from that moment on that that he is Jocelyn’s number one enemy.

\---

Jim tries to like Jocelyn against his better judgment. Tries to get along with her as grade school becomes middle school and she gets closer and closer to Bones.

She decides that she’s not super fond of Jim either. They use Bones as a safe neutral zone, and when Jim starts feeling like a third wheel when high school gets close, he tries not to worry, tries to concentrate on homework and baseball and Gaila and a million other things that won’t remind him that Jocelyn still exists.

\---

Jim’s been suspiciously quiet for way too long. Winona frowns, pausing from where she’s grading term papers, and takes a look at the clock. He should be getting ready for practice, but so far there haven’t been any noises of opening and closing doors, or Jim hollering down the stairs asking where his mitt’s gotten to.

She sighs, pinches the bridge of her nose, and gets up, shaking her head. Trust Jim to fall asleep when he should be getting ready.

“Jim?” She yells from the bottom of the stairs. “Jim, you’ve got practice in fifteen minutes!” No answer. She frowns and goes upstairs, cracking open Jim’s door.

His laptop is on his bed, open to something about Beowulf, but there’s no sign of Jim. In fact, the window’s open, the curtains lazily blowing in the cool, early spring air.

“One of these days, Jim, I’m going to nail your window shut, I swear,” Winona grouses, going back downstairs. She had hoped that Jim would have outgrown sneaking out to go play with his friends sometime back in grade school. Evidently, she was wrong.

The first thing that she does is call Jim’s cellphone, and then decides she’s going to nail Jim to the nailed shut window when she hears it ringing in his room.

Next is Len. No answer. Spock claims he hasn’t seen Jim all day. Somehow Winona doubts that. They’re the only two of Jim’s friends who she has in her phone, so she pulls out the big guns and starts calling parents instead. 

“Hello?”

“Amanda! It’s Winona. I don’t suppose you’ve seen my darling son around?” 

“Is he missing again?”

“I’m thinking about nailing him to the floor to keep him here.”

“I haven’t seen him all day – although, Len did come by for Spock earlier, and I haven’t seen them since. Don’t listen to Spock if he says he hasn’t seen him.” 

“That’s what I was afraid of.”

Lydia’s next. 

“Lydia McCoy.”

“Hi, it’s Winona. Have you seen Jim today?”

“Winona! I still have your salad bowl, by the way – but no, I haven’t seen Jim.” 

“And did Len go running off this morning?”

“He did. Is he not picking up his phone?”

“Of course not.”

“I’m thinking we just install electric tracking chips in them. Think the vet will do that?” 

“No, but your husband might.”

“I’ll ask him.”

\---

“Your mom’s calling me again.” Bones sighs from where he’s splayed out on a low hanging tree branch, sounding totally unenthused.

“Don’t pick it up,” Jim mutters, crossing his arms.

“Are you going to inform us why you decided to skip baseball practice to pace around instead?” Spock sounds bored. 

“It’s a waste of my time,” Jim says dismissively. “We need to discuss the fact that we start high school next year.” 

“Yeah, so what?” Bones is grumpy. The sky is also still blue, and water remains wet. 

“So, this is important!” Jim sort of flails his arms around a bit. “There will be new teachers, new classes, new girls! Well, and a lot of the old girls too, but that’s ok.”

“The company could be worse,” Spock notes dryly. Bones mouths ‘Nyota’, drawing a heart in the air with his finger, and Jim snickers. Spock chooses to look disinterested.

“We need to strategize. Battle plans. Similar schedules, where to-“

“Jim, what makes you think I want a schedule that’s even remotely similar to yours?” Bones drawls, looking down at him. 

“Because we’ve been together in class almost every single year since kindergarten! Do you remember fourth grade, Bones? When we were in different classes? I remembe fourth grade. _It sucked_.” Jim looks deathly serious. “Besides, there are only a few of us taking, like, stupidly advanced classes.”

Bones groans, and his cellphone rings again.

“Dammit!” He chucks it at Jim, who gets brained with it, staggering back.

“You cracked my skull, you jerk!” Jim grabs the phone from the ground, seething.

“My dad’ll fix it,” Bones growls back. “Now answer the phone and talk to mommy like a good boy.”

“You are a sadistic bastard,” Jim mutters, and pops open the phone. “Leonard Horatio McCoy’s phone.” 

“… Jim?” 

Jim’s eyes go wide. That’s not his mom, and he grins, slinking away around the tree. Bones eyes him warily.

“Jocelyn! What can I do for you?” Jim asks, leaning against the tree. Bones suddenly squawks, moving with speed and grace Jim didn’t know he had to skitter across the tree, and reaches down, snagging the phone from Jim’s grasp, glaring murderous intentions at him.

“Joce!” He hefts himself up another branch to stay out of Jim’s grasp. “No, I know, I’m sorry. He’s a moron. Yeah. Um. Sure. Tonight?”

Spock raises an eyebrow, and Jim grins.

“Date night!” Jim says evilly, rubbing his hands together. Spock rolls his eyes. “What do you say to grabbing Nyota and spying on Bones?”

“Why can you not do that?” Spock grouses.

“Because I have other plans.” Jim says simply.

“I’m sure,” Spock replies dryly. “Do they include the grounding you will probably face when you return home?” 

“Uh?”

“I thought as much.”

\---

The night Bones’ Facebook profile says ‘in a relationship with Jocelyn White’, Jim is necking with Gaila at a beach party. It’s almost the end of their freshman year, and it seems like the thing to do, and Gaila’s pretty and honestly, Jim really does like her. They’re friends.

The problem is that they are only friends. Even Gaila acknowledges it. She frowns at Jocelyn for him, when their paths cross during theatre, and they get closer as Jocelyn gets more protective of Bones.

It’s May, junior year no more than a week more of school before finals and then summer, when Bones gets a letter that says he’s been accepted to study at Yale for the Summer Session. Jim knows that he’s going to hate the summer right away. He gets drunk that night at a party at Gaila’s, and they hole up in a bedroom while Bones sits outside with Jocelyn. There’s color high on her cheekbones and her eyes are wet and she’s frowning.

“The whole summer?” She asks, and he wraps her up in his arms, wondering why this feels familiar and wrong all at once. 

“Yeah,” he breathes. He swears he can hear Jim in the distance, like his voice is coming through a cracked open window. He tunes it out when he hears the word _Gaila_ , lower than Jim’s voice normally is.

“Ok.” Jocelyn sucks in a breath, squaring her shoulders. “Yeah, ok.”

Bones squashes the little part of his brain that points out that he should be having this conversation with Jim, his arms wrapped around Jim instead.

\---

The worst part of leaving so far has been dealing with Jim’s kicked puppy expression in the drop off lane of the airport. Sure, Jocelyn had done some vague sniffling and promised to call ‘like every night, I am so sure’, but Jim had looked about ready to kidnap him and refuse to let him leave for the summer.

Jim had actually hugged him when he got out of the car. He’s got Bones’ Jeep for the summer, and he’d dug around in the glove compartment when they got there. Jim had procured a folded piece of paper and his Shuffle (“You don’t need this?” “I’ll just borrow my dad’s, he never uses his.”) and handed them over with a tight smile. The hug had happened shortly after.

And now he’s sitting in seat 17A (ohmyfuckingod, whoever got him a window seat is going to pay bloody fucking murder for this tyrannical move) and running his finger over the edge of the notebook paper. It’s a note from Jim plus a track list – no doubt what’s on the Shuffle. The little blue iPod in question sits cheerily in his lap.

Jim’s always been better at communicating through music, Bones realizes. They’d had the mother of all fights in eighth grade that had been healed by a few mix CDs that had been put in his mailbox and tapped to his window. Every birthday, in addition to an actual gift, there had been a CD slipped inside the card. It’s just something he does.

This one, however, isn’t the usual ‘we’re awesome, let’s rock out and fuck shit up’ playlist. Jim’s always had a habit of wearing his heart on his sleeve, but this might be taking it to a new level.

Especially when he gets to the Taylor Swift song. He’s pretty sure Jim doesn’t even listen to Taylor Swift (this is the boy who professed his undying love for Iggy Pop and Alien Sex Fiend at the ripe old age of thirteen) and yet, here’s this.

He totally misses the announcement to turn off all electrical devices as he plays the song over and over, and when he finally comes up for air he realizes that he doesn’t have to freak out about take off, because they’re already in the air.

As soon as they land he sends Jim a text – _I’m the one on the bleachers, not you. You better win all of your games this summer you fucker. (and don’t get any ideas about wearing short skirts.)_

All he gets back is _love you too, Bones._

When one of the kids across the hall comes by the first night to ask if he wants to go to go grab dinner in the dining hall, she doesn’t ask why Bones has Taylor Swift blaring on his computer, but she looks likes she might want to.

He’s glad she doesn’t ask though, because he’s not sure if it’s proper etiquette to explain to people you just met two hours ago that you and your best friend have probably been in love since you were six and you’re just now realizing this.

He ends up on the phone with Jim just as much as Jocelyn that summer. When he gets back, Jim’s waiting for him at the airport, the Jeep in tow.

\---

Bones would find this whole situation totally ridiculous on a moronic level if he were actually paying attention to anything at the moment.

Instead he’s splayed out the floor of the stage, staring up at the lights, and wondering what he’s going to do with his life now. Next thing you know he’ll lose his spot as top of the class (which he’s tied with Spock for), not get into a good school, never make it into med school, and wash out, flipping burgers ten years down the line and sobbing quietly to himself for being such a failure. His tears will season the fries, he’s sure.

He closes his eyes, mentally berating himself for being such a drama queen, and then nearly has a heart attack when he hears someone opening up the doors to the auditorium. He shoots up into a sitting position, looking around. There’s a figure at the back, in the dark area under the balcony.

“Joce?” He calls. Maybe she’s come to apologize, right? Un-break up? That sounds good.

“Nope, just me,” the figure calls back, stepping into the light with an easy grin. Jim’s got his hands shoved into his pockets, and he’s wearing a pair of slip-on sandals, his jersey halfway unbuttoned, which probably means that he came racing over here halfway through getting ready for practice. “Gossip travels fast.”

“Go away,” Bones mutters when Jim gets to the stage, hefting himself up and frowning down at Bones. The lights cast a halo around Jim’s blonde head, almost obscuring his worried expression.

“I am not letting my best bro wallow in misery because some chick decided to be an asshat of epic proportions and break up with him.” He sits down next to Bones. “She’s a bitch, Len. Let it go.”

Jim’s got an expression that Bones has never seen before, and he takes a second to process that Jim had just called him by his actual name, which happens about once in a blue moon.

“She – god Jim. I thought we were actually going to last and now I’m being stupid about it.” He rolls onto his side, towards Jim, and Jim just reaches out, giving his shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “I was stupid to think we’d even make it through high school.”

“Nah, man, you guys had something really good going. She just lost her rhythm and went off the deep end. It’s not your fault.” Jim’s taking this all in stride rather well. Bones didn’t even know he was capable of offering advice.

“She said it was because of leaving for this whole summer,” Bones mumbles, his cheek pressed to the cool black wood of the floor.

“Well she’s wrong. You may have left for a few months, but you came back tan and smarter, so that counts for something.” Jim’s smile is almost as bright as the lights.

“Because tan and smarter is totally worth it.”

“Well, duh.” Jim stares down at him for another second, his smile gradually lessening, and when he opens his mouth again his voice is low and quiet. “There are still people who care about you, Bones.”

The way Jim’s looking at him is harsh and passionate, and Bones is suddenly reminded of the loving little kid that Jim used to be, emotions on his sleeves for everyone to see. Jim’s gotten better at hiding them from the world, but maybe he’s never been very good at keeping them from Bones.

\---

Rehearsal ends in a fiery ball of crazy when Jocelyn breaks character spectacularly and starts ribbing out Bones in the middle of a scene where they’re supposed to be flirting. Instead Lord Goring and Mabel are at each other’s throats, and the director is ready to throw his script at their heads.

He calls the whole mess and lets the set crew on to finish painting, so that he can call Bones and Jocelyn over to talk to them.

“We’re going to have issues.” Mr. Wynn is tapping his foot on the floor, his hair artfully draped over one eye. “Fix them now, or I will pull up your understudies.”

“But-“ Jocelyn looks crushed. 

“No buts! I’m not kidding!”

“That’s not fair!” Bones tries. “It’s not my fault!”

“This is all your fault for leaving me!” Jocelyn rounds on him. “The whole summer, gone!” 

“You said it was ok!” Bones takes a step back.

“Guys, guys! Stop!” Mr. Wynn waves the binder in his hands around, trying to run interference. Jocelyn instead hauls Bones in by his cravat, so they’re inches apart. “Not the costumes!”

“You left me. For an Ivy League. And then you come running back. Not for me, but for that jock!”

“He’s not a jock!” Bones growls, shoving Jocelyn off. “And you’re friends with him too! You’ve known him since third grade!” 

“Yeah, well, if I’d known you’d go all gay on me-“

“ENOUGH!”

Both of them fall silent, and have the decency to look at their feet.

“Work. It. Out. You have the weekend to do so. I’ll run Sir and Lady Chiltern’s scenes this weekend instead of yours. You have until Monday, otherwise I’m puling Kathy and Jeff up. Dismissed.” Mr. Wynn watches them go. “McCoy, get back here for a second.”

Bones frowns, but comes back.

“Look, don’t screw this up any more than you have. I want to do Cabaret in the spring.” Bones’ mouth drops open.

“Oh.” He manages to get out.

“Yeah, oh. There’s a pair of leather pants with your name on them if you can just make it through the next two weeks. Don’t make me regret it.”

“I won’t, I swear. Oh god. Seriously?” Bones is not going to bounce up and down, he is so totally not, that would ruin his carefully crafted air of disinterested and jaded. 

“Seriously. Now get.”

\---

All Jim had heard was “Yeah, we need leather pants for Len” at lunch one day (when your best friend is a theatre geek, you tend to sit with other theatre kids) when he decided that fuck baseball, he was going to work around it this season and try to help with the play. I mean, Coach totally wouldn’t mind him missing practice every once and a while, right? Right. There’s no reason he even needs to be on the team.

Well, except for all the scholarships and being the star pitcher and whatever, but that’s irrelevant.

“Um, hey, who’s in charge of the set for this one?” Jim pipes up, leaning around Gaila. Bones is MIA, which means he’s probably stayed late in Anatomy, which he has right before lunch.

“McKenna,” one of the girls answers. “Why?”

“Well, I mean, I thought that maybe I could finally help you guys out, right?” He tries not to look like he’s staring down a den of lions. The theatre kids are Bad Ass. With the capital letters and all. “I can paint. And I’m kind of handy with a power drill.”

“Talk to him.” The girl shrugs. “Although don’t you have baseball?”

“I can work around it.” Jim grins. Oh, he’ll work around it. Anything to see Bones in leather pants.

\---

It turns out it takes him a bit to work around it, and it’s a month into the production before he can actually make it to rehearsal one day. It’s a day of nothing but batting practice, and really, Jim’s the pitcher, so it’s just assumed he sucks at hitting, so whatever. He can deal with it later. He had at least made a show of getting ready, which means he’s wearing his practice uniform, and he feels extremely out of place when a group of girls in sequined mini dresses walk by, one of them talking about something to do with a song for the play. He rubs at the back of his neck, winding his way through the seats to where he spots Gaila, who’s done up in a cute little number that looks like it wouldn’t squeak past the school dress code even if the Principal was drunk and on uppers. It doesn’t help that Gaila’s got the most amazing boobs ever bestowed upon a high schooler, and they’re not listening to their confines very well.

“Gaila!” He hisses, getting her attention and attempting to hide from Jocelyn, who’s only a few feet away. “Have you seen Bones?”

“You haven’t?” She asks skeptically, raising an eyebrow.

“I know he’s like attached to my hip, but no, I don’t always know where he is.”

“No, I mean, how’d you miss what’s currently going on up on stage?” She jerks her head in that direction, and Jim looks. Which is about when his mouth drops open and he has to sit down. He plops down into one of the seats as Gaila smirks. 

“I have no idea,” he breathes out, and Gaila actually laughs.

Bones is up on stage with Mr. Wynn and a whole lot of interesting lighting, plus some more sequined dress girls. He’s facing away from the auditorium, so all Jim can see is Bones’ bare back (except for some weird harness) and leather. A lot of leather. Tight leather. Those must have been the pants the costume crew was talking about. They end in a pair of unlaced combat boots that they’re tucked into.

When Bones turns around Jim’s pretty sure his eyes bug out. Yeah, that’s totally a harness. The kind of harness that’s going to make the administration have a collective conniption. And there’s more leather, and holy cow. He’s wearing make- up, his lips red and his eyes ringed in dark eyeshadow. And now Jim understands why he had shaved down the sides of his hair – it’s gelled up into a fauxhawk.

“Oh my god.” Gaila sits down next to him, neatly snapping his jaw shut with one of her long fingers, which seems to have unhinged itself. It doesn’t stay closed for long though - when Bones spots him, instead of waving or rolling his eyes, which would be normal, he winks and blows Jim a kiss. “Oh. My. God.”

“Isn’t theatre awesome?” Gaila asks happily, leaning on Jim’s shoulder. “Also, you smell like a locker room.” 

Jim’s only reply is “Oh. My. Fucking. God.”

\---

Evidently the costume that Jim saw Bones in isn’t the worst. In fact, by the time he’s sat through a dress rehearsal he’s pretty sure that Mr. Wynn bribed the administration to get away with this. Bones in leather pants and a bondage harness? Not that bad when Gaila’s got a v-necked blouse that plunges almost to her navel and, oh yeah, there’s that part with Bones in a pair of hot pants and a corset.

When Gaila had said ‘sit through a dress rehearsal so that you don’t embarrass yourself in a packed auditorium on opening night’ she hadn’t been kidding. He’s currently salivating in the wings, draped over Gaila for support.

“You have a rather perfect view down my shirt like that,” Gaila grumbles, crossing her arms over her chest.

“That’s not a shirt, Gaila, that’s a scrap of fabric split down the middle,” Jim mutters back. He may have snuck a peek when he’d first found Gaila, but then they’d started the run through of the second act, and oh hey, there’s Bones in that corset.

Mr. Wynn stops everything, snapping at something off stage and yelling at someone named “Janice!” (Jim can hear the exclamation mark) and Jim has to wonder what the point of a run through is if Mr. Wynn is stopping everyone every five minutes.

Bones and his cabaret girls (Jim knows they have names – like Idaho and French Fries or something – but that’s irrelevant) sort of kick around through the last few steps in their dance while Janice! and Mr. Wynn talk about something in the orchestra pit.

He’s never noticed it before, but Bones has really nice legs. He’s also now the only guy in the whole school (not counting the swim team) who’s got legs that smooth.

“Bones has nice legs,” Jim murmurs, still clinging to Gaila.

“When did I become your fag hag?” Gaila thinks about shrugging him off, but whatever. “I mean, I’ve seen your dick.” 

“Speaking of, you can’t get angry at me for looking down your shirt if I’m intimately acquainted with your rack already,” Jim points out.

“Ok, forget the fag hag comment. You couldn’t be gay if your life depended on it.” 

“Duh, I’m straight.”

“And Bones?”

“Ok, straight and Bones-sexual.” 

Gaila rolls her eyes.

“Are you going to make a move on him any time this century?” 

“I tried already.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, we were like six. I tried again in fourth grade. Asked him to marry me and everything.” Gaila slips out from under his arms to give him a look.

“Seriously?” She says dryly. 

“Swear to god. I even had a ring.”

Gaila laughs and Mr. Wynn cranes his neck over the top of the stage to shoot them a dirty look. Gaila mouths a ‘sorry!’ and Jim tries to look like he actually belongs around here. Which is difficult when you’re wearing a baseball cap and pants, but whatever. He’s at least making an effort and wearing a theatre t-shirt (this one is from Our Town). And he’d learned the hard way that cleats on Mr. Wynn’s stage meant certain death, so he’s got a pair of slip on sandals on instead.

Eventually they start back up and Gaila’s got to go on, and Jim actually has a job to do (something about moving set pieces and furniture. Mr. Wynn had taken one look at his arms and sent him to be part of stage crew) which distracts him from bothering Bones. Which is good, he’s sure, because this is Bones’ turf and not his. It’s not like Bones comes and bothers him in the bottom of the sixth or anything.

It’s after eight before Mr. Wynn tells everyone to get out of there for the night, and Jim happily collapses on the edge of the stage, letting his legs hang off of it. After a while Bones wanders up, looking down at him. He’s in street clothes, and he’s managed to get the lipstick totally off, but there’s still some eyeshadow smeared around his eyes, and it makes him look tired.

“My job is tiring,” Jim sighs, letting his arms flop around.

“Try singing and dancing in a corset and combat boots,” Bones replies, giving Jim what he’s taken to calling The Look. It generally means ‘you’re stupid/I can’t believe I put up with you/you’re going to get us killed’. It’s Bones’ way of showing affection, Jim’s sure. “Are you even running during the play? I thought you were busy.”

“I’ll be here for closing night, I swear. Even if I have to pitch a no-hitter to get here just as the curtain goes up.” He lets Bones help him up. “I can totally do that.”

“I know you can.” Bones runs a hand through his hair, trying to get it to lay flat. “And you should actually watch the play, not spend your time moving furniture and walls.”

“How do you know I can’t do both?” Jim asks with a smirk as he gets his backpack from a chair in the front row. 

“Because not even you can be in two places at one. Seriously, watch the play. Mr. Wynn already loves you because he thinks you’re the cutest thing this side of sliced bread and kittens.”

“Sliced bread is cute?” Jim can’t help it. He ducks out of the way of Bones’ punch and runs ahead. 

“I’ll race you to the car!” 

“Fuck you!” Bones takes chase as Jim laughs, loping out the front door easily ahead of him, the evening air cool against his skin.

\---

Bones’ fingers tap against the desk, his other hand cradling his head. The minutes in study hall tend to tick by at a painfully slow pace. He’d rather have something to actually do.

Jim, on the other hand, who’s sitting five seats down from Bones (there’s been a note in their schedules since second semester of freshman year that they are not to be put in the same study hall, and if it has to happen, they can’t sit next to each other) is totally engrossed in the movement of Bones’ fingers. Tonight’s night two of Cabaret, and his nails are still painted from opening night. It looks odd and garish against his plain blue t-shirt and jeans, but at the same time – something twists in Jim’s stomach at the sight of the black color. The hair helps too. Bones hasn’t been gelling it during the day, but it still flops down over his forehead, and Jim really wants to figure out what the shorn sides feel like under his hands.

The fact is, he’s certainly entertained fantasies about Bones before. Like, a lot of them. Bones is hot. Bones got even hotter after he came back from the East Coast. Point being: this is not the first time he’s thought about jumping Bones. But now it’s different, because suddenly Jocelyn’s not in the picture anymore. She always had been before, and she acted as a buffer between Jim and Bones. Which was fine, Jim’s always been afraid of totally destroying their friendship if he made a move on Bones. They’re best friends, not anything more, and even just being friends is something Jim is insanely thankful for.

And yet, he seems a whole lot more open and reachable now. Gaila’s been shoving him in that direction for ages, and Uhura’s even started making cracks about it. But still, there’s this huge chasm he’d have to jump across, and he’s really worried he’s not going to make it to the other side. So instead he just watches the drum of Bones’ black nails on the desktop and wonders what they’d feel like digging into his back, with Bones writhing under him.

\---

There are two things James T. Kirk does not fuck around about in life: pizza and baseball games.

So when he says he’s going to throw a no-hitter to get to closing night by the time the curtain rises, he’s not kidding.

In fact, if he can strike this last batter out, he’ll be good. He’s got three minutes to do so, race across the street, and thank the gods that this is a home game. He can hear his mom and dad in the stands (Bones is usually at his games too, but he’s got a totally legit excuse for missing this one), and actually a fair amount of people. Evidently the last game of the year draws people out of the woodwork when there are no other sporting events to go to. Although people have been slipping out since the top of the ninth – and Jim totally wishes he was one of them. Everyone’s going to the play. Not only is theatre big at school, but this is Bones’ last performance, and he’s kind of a minor celebrity at this point. Rumors have been flying around for months that he got accepted to Julliard, that he’s leaving them all in the dust to go be the next big thing on Broadway. (Jim really wants to see the looks on their faces when all the seniors get sheets next week that list where everyone’s going and what they’re majoring in. He can see it now – “Len’s doing _what?_ At _where?!_ ”)

If he weren’t so focused on getting to the play, it would have occurred to him that he’s pitching a motherfucking _no-hitter_. If this isn’t the best pitching of career, he doesn’t know what is. Evidently the promise of Bones in leather pants and a corset trumps all other motivation in the history of everything.

The batter’s some beefy guy who’s the other team’s left fielder, and Jim thinks he’d look more at home on a football field than a baseball diamond, but whatever. All he’s got to do is throw three more pitches and be done.

Of course, he’s been paranoid since the goddamn announcer had to mention that it was a no-hitter during the last inning. First rule of baseball: you don’t do shit like that. This is what happens when you get the guy who usually does their basketball games to fill in for the last baseball game. He’d seen Coach actually wince when the announcer had mentioned it.

But only three more. Three’s a lucky number, right? Pitch one goes sailing straight through the strike zone, and the batter doesn’t see fit to swing at it for some mind-boggling reason. Whatever, makes Jim’s life easier. Two’s a little on the outside, and he’s afraid the ump won’t call it a strike, but the guy chases the ball anyway. Jim’s grinning now. He can hear his mom whooping and hollering. Coach is offering his firstborn from the dugout if he can get this last strike.

He’s pretty sure his three minutes are up. He’s praying Mr. Wynn is giving some inspiring speech and the play will start late.

Their catcher, Riley, gives a little nod, and Jim bites his lip, and decides, that what the hell, this could be the last pitch of his high school career. He’ll probably hurt his shoulder, but he’s got a whole summer to ice it if needs be.

Fingers on the raised seams, the ball rough under his palm, he throws _hard_. The kind of fastball that the batter realizes is coming towards him way too late to do shit about it. In fact, he goes down swinging way after the ball has made a happy ‘thwack’ against the leather of Riley’s mitt.

If everyone was holding their breath on that last pitch, then they’re suddenly screaming. Either that or Jim was temporarily deaf for the time the ball took to get from his hand to Riley’s. And suddenly Riley’s got him in a hug (“Ow, jerk, get your goddamn facemask out of my face!”) and he’s hollering something, people are standing up, and the rest of the team is making an absolutely ruckus from the dugout.

“You – man! Oh my god! You’re like _the man._ ” Riley’s totally flapping his arms around.

“What time is it?” Jim breathes, and Riley gives him a look as if to say, “what the flying fuck?” 

“It’s 7:32,” Riley says, looking down at his watch.

“ _Fuck_.” He starts to run when Riley grabs his wrist. 

“What the hell, man?”

“Cabaret!” Jim says before he squirms out of Riley’s grip and goes sprinting across the field, past first base, flying past his parents (and shoving his hat and mitt at his mom, who’s trying to give him a hug) and across the street. He nearly knocks into a pair of girls walking across the front lawn of the school as he runs past them, bodily slamming into the main doors and shoving through them, sliding across the floor of the atrium in his cleats.

Uhura’s putting up posters for the last issue of the newspaper (coming out next week!) and gives him a look before looking at the clock above her, understanding dawning on her face.

“Run Forrest, run!” She calls after him, laughing as he half runs, half skates down the main hall.

The kids handing out programs are just closing the doors when he skids to a halt in front of the auditorium.

“You sure know how to make an entrance,” one of them notes dryly with a raised eyebrow, holding the door open just long enough for him to slip into the darkened auditorium. He sags against the back wall, trying to get his breathing under control just as the curtain goes up.

Ok, so he takes three things seriously in life: pizza, baseball games, and the boy currently on stage wearing nothing but leather, surrounded by girls in sequins, and lit up in a million different colors, his arms thrown wide as the orchestra launches into the first song.

\---

Amazingly, Jim isn’t at Bones’ locker after school. Except for during the baseball season, when he’d have to run across the street to the athletic complex, he was always there, leaning against the locker next to Bones’ like it was where he belonged.

It’s disconcerting, especially because it’s their last day of high school. Ever. They’re done.

His locker is mostly cleaned out – he’s been taking things home slowly over the past week – and all he’s got left is his chemistry AP textbook, which he didn’t want to sell back because they hadn’t quite gotten to the last 3 chapters, and a few spirals and folders. He shoves everything his old medic’s bag (a gift from Jim) and slams his locker shut for the last time. It’s satisfying, hearing the resulting clang of metal. It’s final.

Of course, he’s not about to leave school without Jim, so he checks Jim’s locker (not there) and then his last class of the day (nope) and ends up running into one of Jim’s buddies from the baseball team, but he hasn’t seen him either.

Bones is about to give up and hope that Jim has his cellphone on when he walks past the auditorium and stops dead before backing up a few steps to look through the open doors.

There’s someone standing on the very edge of the stage, turned away from the auditorium, the backs of their feet hanging off the edge. If the athletic bag slung across the person’s back wasn’t a dead give away, the yellow Chucks would have been.

Bones is quiet as he walks down one of the aisles, pulling himself up onto the stage next to Jim. He can see that Jim’s eyes are closed, but there’s a smile on his face.

“This is probably the last place I would have looked for you.” He elbows Jim, grinning.

“Sorry.” Jim opens his eyes, taking a step forward and turning to Bones. “I had to clean out my gym locker, and I thought that – I don’t know. For some reason I thought you’d be here. Last day and all.”

Bones looks up, his eyes tracing the arch of the proscenium. The lights are bright, and something occurs to him as he stares up at them.

“You know how to use the hand set.” Bones frowns. Maybe he never really realized how much time Jim spent around here. 

“Huh?” Jim looks confused.

“The hand set on stage right for the lights. Unless the lights were on when you got in here, and that seems unlikely.” 

“Oh, yeah. McKenna taught me how to use it like last year.”

Bones looks over at Jim. Under the lights, bright and stripped of all their gels, he seems to glow. His hair isn’t just blonde, it’s straight up gold.

“I thought you didn’t even really like theatre.”

Jim just shrugs, tucking his hands in his pockets.

“You were here.”

If that isn’t a confession, Bones doesn’t know what is. He’s suddenly aware of a familiar feeling under his skin – stage fright – and he actually laughs at himself, letting his head tip back.

“You ok?” Jim looks startled.

“God, I just – I’m a moron.” He shakes his head at himself, biting his bottom lip to keep from laughing again. 

“Why now?” Jim just grins. Bones thinks about elbowing him again, but the desire to do something else wins out.

Jim’s turned halfway towards him, so he moves, planting himself right in front of Jim, and before Jim can ask what the heck he’s doing, he grabs his face in both hands and kisses him.

Jim makes a shocked noise at the back of his throat, and for one horrible moment Bones thinks he’s going to pull back, but then he’s got a hand around Bones’ waist, pulling them together, flush against each other, his mouth opening under Bones’. They’re about the same height, although Bones may have an inch on Jim, and it feels weird to be kissing someone who isn’t like half a foot shorter than he is. Weird in a good way. Weird in the sense that as soon as they part, both breathing hard, he wants to do it again.

Jim presses his forehead against Bones’, smiling, his lips parted.

“If that makes you a moron, you need to be a moron more often. Like, all the time if possible.” Jim’s voice is kind of rough around the edges, and it makes Bones grin.

“Actually, doing that makes me not a moron,” Bones teases, running a thumb over Jim’s jaw. 

“I totally agree,” Jim says solemnly before he kisses Bones again.

And here Bones was thinking that the most exhilaration he’d ever felt on this stage was somewhere between “Willkommen” and curtain call for closing night of Cabaret. Evidently he was wrong. And he’s totally ok with that.

\---

Bones parks in the last spot in the row of spaces on the blacktop facing the ocean, just sitting there for a second, listening to the quiet that’s descended. The parking lot is deserted, and really, the beach is closed, but no one pays attention to those rules anyway. He’s been to a million bonfires on the beach after nightfall.

Jim stirs in the passenger seat, a frown appearing on his face. He’s slumped forward, his arms crossed, where he’d fallen asleep after bitching about not having a door to fall asleep on – Bones had taken them off a few weeks ago, right after school ended and he wasn’t worried about shit getting stolen out of the car during the school day.

Bones watches him for a second, smiling faintly. Jim’s always been able to fall asleep pretty much anywhere. Bones reaches out, ruffling his hair, and Jim blinks slowly, licking at his lips.

“’ere are we?” His voice sounds dry and cracked, and he clears his throat. 

“Muir Beach.” Bones stretches, arching his back.

“Fuck,” Jim murmurs. “You drove all the way to Muir?” 

“Yeah, kinda just got into a rhythm and didn’t stop.” 

“You hate driving.”

Bones just shrugs, staring at Jim. His hair is a mess from the wind, and he’s burrowed into his sweatshirt, still waking up. Bones ends up running his hand through Jim’s hair again, and he leans into it, letting Bones rest his hand on the back of his neck.

“Hey Bones?” Jim asks eventually, turning towards him, his eyes bright.

“Yeah?” Bones isn’t sure he likes the feral grin Jim’s got going on. “I am not going skinny dipping, just to put that out there now.”

“Nah, man, I’m not nuts, I like not freezing my dick off – but speaking of my dick, we should have sex.” 

“Excuse me?” Bones doesn’t move, but he’s pretty sure his jaw has dropped open.

“Yeah, we totally should. No one’s around, it’s all good.” 

“Right now?!”

“Yep.” He bites his tongue and nods his head with a little grin in a gesture that Bones recognizes as something he’s picked up from Gaila.

“Jim, for god’s sake, we’re in the middle of a public beach in a car that doesn’t have a top or doors! In what universe is this a good idea?” Bones is sure he’s got the crazed eyebrow look going on currently, but he can’t be bothered to care.

“Many universes. Including this one.” Jim sounds rather chipper for someone who was just asleep five minutes ago.

“No way, that’s-mmfphh!” Whatever he was going to say is silenced by Jim lunging forward across the center console to launch an assault on his mouth that he’s sure Jim would call a kiss. Something at the back of Bones’ mind clicks, and he scrambles across the car, kicking the gearshift in the process, and ending up straddling Jim’s lap. Jim wraps his arms around Bones’ waist to hold him close, tucking his hands into Bones’ back pockets.

Bones slips his hands under Jim’s hoodie, skimming Jim’s skin with his palms, feeling the heat that he’s radiating. Jim’s nothing but planes of smooth skin and taut muscles, and it’s so much different from anything he’s ever done with Jocelyn, starting with the fact that he’s in Jim's lap. But this feels amazing, Jim feels amazing, under his hands and against his chest, and he wants more. It takes some work to get Jim’s hoodie off over his head and then Jim is right back at his mouth, working his way down Bones’ neck.

“Don’t you dare leave a mark, fucker,” Bones growls. “My mom will kill us both.” Jim rolls his eyes, working at Bones’ belt.

“I’m not dumb, contrary to popular belief,” Jim answers against Bones’ skin before he pulls back, licking at his lips and breathing hard. “However, if we’re talking about things that we are, let me just say that you look really hot like this.”

Bones glares at him, and Jim grins.

“Learn how to take a compliment, Bones.” Jim ducks back to Bones’ neck, and Bones decides not to answer when he can run his hands down Jim’s back instead, dragging his nails over that smooth skin. Everything picks up after that – and really, he’s not totally clueless, but he’s only ever had sex with one other person in his life, and that happened to be someone who was certainly not a guy, so it’s a little off balance. There are some awkward knees and elbows and breathy laughs, but eventually Jim gets them moving in some sort of rhythm, together in one of his broad hands, and Bones sort of forgets that he’s trying to be quiet and that he has to drive home, and a million other things, because it’s just _Jim_.

They end up pressed together in the backseat under a blanket that Bones had thrown in the back of the car after the senior picnic, and Bones nearly falls asleep. Jim does, and Bones lets him, only waking him up to shove him into the front seat, where he falls right back asleep.

Bones sits in the driver’s seat for a while after that, rubbing absentmindedly at the hickey that Jim had left on his shoulder. (“I said no marks!” “Clothes, Bones! They cover things!”) The ocean is a black expanse of rolling waves expanding out in front of him, and he sighs, turning on the car. As soon as he’s messed with reverse and drive, he reaches out for the hand that Jim has curled around the edges of the blanket, holding it closed across his chest, and Jim’s awake enough that he murmurs something and grips Bones’ hand. Their fingers stay twined together the whole drive home, and Jim doesn’t even make it back across the street, so they collapse together in Bones’ too-small bed, curled together.

\---

Winona feels like she’s been here before. It’s now almost noon, and it’s been suspiciously quiet upstairs. Granted, she didn’t hear Jim come in last night, so she’s assuming he got in late (and no doubt past his curfew, they’d have to have a chat about that) but still, he’s usually up by now.

She sighs, getting up and going upstairs. Jim’s door is still shut, and she opens it quietly, peeking inside. Instead of Jim sprawled out in bed, the bed’s empty and unmade, exactly like it was yesterday. Winona purses her lips, glaring. She’s pretty sure she never had to deal with this with Sam.

She picks up the phone in the hall, dialing across the street. It rings twice before Lydia picks up.

“Lydia, you haven’t seen my son, have you?” She pinches the bridge of her nose, leaning her hip against the phone table. 

“Is he not home?” Lydia sounds vaguely worried.

“Nope. I don’t think he ever came home last night.”

“Let me go check.” There’s a gentle thunk of Lydia putting down the phone, and Winona waits, staring at the ceiling and wondering how much she’s going to freak out if Jim isn’t at the McCoy’s.

She’s contemplating who should get called next (The hospital? George? The police? Spock?) when Lydia comes back on the line.

“Oh, he’s here alright.” She sounds vaguely put off. “I’ll send him home, I think I need to have a chat with Leonard.”

“What did they do now? And how much do I owe you in property damage?” Winona’s at least happy that Jim isn’t dead on the side of the road somewhere.

“The house is thankfully intact. Their virtue may not be.”

Winona’s so glad she’s not drinking anything, because it would have just been spewed all over the hallway. 

“Do send him home, please.” Winona swears that Jim is going to be the end of her.

Jim stumbles in about ten minutes later, looking like he’s still asleep. In fact, he’s still got a blanket curled around him. He tries to get past Winona, but she steers him towards the kitchen, shoving him down at the table.

“First of all, you’re going to eat something, because I know you skipped dinner last night.” Winona’s standing with her hands on her hips, not looking too happy.

“Bones and I got burgers,” Jim mumbles, pillowing his head in his arms on the table.

“And secondly,” she just keeps talking, “we’re going to have a chat about how you are not allowed to miss your curfew to act inappropriately.”

“Act inappropriately?” Jim blinks blearily at her. 

“Have sex.”

Jim snaps his head all the way up, looking suddenly very alert and awake.

“Which I totally didn’t do,” he says a bit too quickly. “How’d you even jump to that conclusion?” 

“Jim, I spoke to Lydia this morning.”

“Oh.” Jim suddenly looks rather worried. “Oh. Um. How is she?” 

“You just saw her.”

“Well, yeah, but I mean – you have no substantial evidence.” Jim suddenly locks down, leaning back in the chair and looking downright stoic.

“You’re right, I don’t. I’m going on a hunch here. Look, I understand how you feel about Len-“

“No you don’t,” Jim mutters.

“-don’t pull the petulant teenager thing with me, James.” That shuts Jim up pretty quickly. “I understand how you feel. However, I’d appreciate it if you conducted yourself in an appropriate way when at the McCoy’s.”

“We weren’t at the McCoy’s,” Jim mumbles, and then instantly realizes what he’s said, because his eyes go wide. “By which I mean-“

“That doesn’t make it any better,” Winona cuts him off. “Although seemingly I can’t stop you from doing anything.” Jim wisely doesn’t reply. “I’d appreciate if you didn’t have sex, but my opinion on that isn’t going to have any baring on you. So in the mean time, I’d appreciate if you didn’t have sex in the house, or the car, and if you do, would you please be safe?”

“Did you just give me the ok to screw Bones?” Jim narrows his eyes at her. 

“Jim!”

“What?”

Winona sighs. Again.

“Lastly. Next time you miss your curfew you’re grounded.” 

“Mom!”

\---

It’s getting dark out when Jim finally decides to stop driving. They’ve been doing a lot of that this summer – trading off, just going, never really with a destination in mind.

The little league fields are five minutes from their houses, but Jim takes twenty-five to get there. Bones grabs the beer and Jim grabs the blanket and they end up sitting against the backstop behind home plate of the west-facing field, watching the sunset and drinking crappy beer that Sam had enthusiastically provided.

“Sam is such a bad influence,” Jim mutters, letting his head fall back against the chain link fence and making it rattle. 

“Honestly, I think you’re good on your own,” Bones replies, drawing little patterns in the dirt.

“Yeah, probably.” Jim presses his mouth into a thin line, breathing out through his nose. “Do not let me get drunk off of this crap.”

“I won’t.” Bones reaches out to drag a dusty finger down Jim’s nose, something that might be a smile hovering around his lips. “Too bad we don’t have a bat, you could make me try to hit shit.”

Jim laughs, biting his lip and grinning. Bones was always the catcher or the batter, whichever he thought he needed more, any time he’d needed to practice through his years in baseball. Jim’s actually proud of how well Bones can play baseball for someone who never officially has. He’s sure got lightning quick reflexes that make him a good catch.

Bones takes a drink and then chases a drop of beer rolling down the neck of the bottle with his tongue, licking it up before it can get to his thumb. Jim watches him, marveling at the fact that he knows what that tongue feels like – against his skin, his lips, his hands. He’s got no clue how he got this lucky. He puts down his bottle and pulls Bones towards him, arms wrapped around his shoulders, and Bones rests his head on Jim’s shoulder, curled against him.

“Tomorrow’s gonna suck,” Jim murmurs.

“Don’t look at it that way.” Bones frowns, huffing.

“My roommate is going to hate me, my classes are going to suck, you’re not gonna be there…” He trails off, planting a fierce kiss on the top of Bones’ head.

“I’m only an hour away,” Bones reminds him, burying his head in the crook of Jim’s neck, breathing in, smelling Jim – sweat and dirt and his shampoo.

“Yeah, but still.” Jim shifts a bit, lets Bones tangle their legs together. “You won’t be across the street anymore.”

“I know.” Bones voice breaks a bit on the ‘know’, and Jim doesn’t reply, just gives him a squeeze that should probably feel reassuring.

\---

There are cheery nametags (Jim’s is a fish shaped paper cutout, his roommate’s is a starfish) on the door to room 304 when Jim gets there. He looks at them, frowning. The handwriting is looped and bubbly, and it makes it worry about just how freakishly happy his RA is going to be. He hasn’t seen her yet, but she’d sent them all very chipper emails over the summer about the goings on in Davidson Hall and her overuse of exclamation points worried Jim just a bit.

Jim shoves open the door with a foot, stopping just inside the door when he nearly bumps into a kid.

“Oh, fuck, sorry-“ Jim backs up, letting the kid move out of the way. Jim slides around him and drops the box he’s carrying on the floor, turning to the other guy.

“Uh, hi.” He holds out a hand to Jim. “Are you James?”

“Jim, but yeah.” He smiles, shaking the kid’s hand. “Which makes you Hikaru?”

“And you can totally call me Sulu,” the kid answers with a laugh. “So where are you from?”

“Palo Alto. You?” Jim kicks the box open and frowns when he sees it’s nothing but books. This is probably Bones’ handiwork.

“San Francisco. Haight-Ashbury,” Sulu answers as he goes back to shoving things in one of the closets. 

“Oh sweet.” Jim pulls a book from the box. “Why do I have a copy of Gray’s Anatomy?”

“You’re pre med?” Sulu suggests. 

“Pre law. The medical student is-“

Currently kicking the door open, looking rather irritated.

“Your mother is nuts,” Bones bitches as he unceremoniously dumps a pile of sheets and towels on the bed that hasn’t been taken yet. “She wants to take you shopping for like decorations and Christmas lights and I have no clue what else.”

“Bones, meet Sulu.” Jim makes a ‘turn around’ gesture with his finger and Bones does so. 

“Oh, hey, sorry. I’m Len.” Bones looks flustered still.

“Hey, no problem. Where’re you’re rooming?” Sulu asks, leaning against the post of his bed. 

“About an hour south of here,” Bones says. “I go to Stanford.”

“Damn, is everyone from Palo Alto smart?” Sulu laughs.

“Nope, we’re just that awesome.” Jim flops down on the bed, bouncing a bit. “Also, these beds suck.”

Jim says this just as the door is flung open for a third time. There’s a brunette standing in the doorway, wearing a Cal shirt and a grin so huge Jim’s afraid it’s going to split her face in half.

“Welcome to college life!” She throws her arms as wide as they’ll go in the cramped doorway. Ah, that’d be the RA then.

\---

It’s just past eleven on a Sunday morning sometime during their sophomore year when Bones comes blazing through the door to Jim’s dorm like a man possessed. And also loaded down with bags of groceries.

Jim is only half conscious and mildly hung-over, nursing a bowl of Ramen from his place on the beanbag between the two sets of bunk beds. He looks up when Bones kicks open the door and frowns, because Bones never comes up here. He always goes down to Bones. After all, he’s the one with the Jeep.

Jim and the other three guys he rooms with all look totally confused, especially when Bones blazes right past them, ignoring the movie they’d turned on to stave off various stages of sort-of-drunk to mostly-dead, and deposits the bags on the kitchen table, going to putter around the kitchen and pull various things from the cabinets.

“Oi, hey?” Kyle’s voice is muffled from where it’s pressed into his pillow. “I don’t think this is your room.”

“Bones?” Jim gets up, clutching the bowl of Ramen to his chest, and shuffles over to the kitchen area. “What’re you doing here?”

“Your mother called,” Bones says, sounding rather irritated.

“She called you?” Jim drops down in one of the kitchen chairs, rubbing at his hair. “Why?”

“Evidently, and I don’t know how this slipped by me, you don’t have a meal plan this year. So you’re living on Ramen, as you’re currently demonstrating. Do you know what that shit can do to your body? It’s like eating a salt lick Jim, and you’re not a horse.”

“What do horses have to do with this?” Jim looks even more confused.

“You know, salt licks? Horses? They eat them?” Bones glares at Jim and then sighs, fishing a bottle of Tylenol out of one of the bags and a bunch of bananas out of another, and hands them to Jim while grabbing his bowl of Ramen.

“Hey!” Jim protests, pouting.

“Eat one of those, take two of the Tylenol, and I’ll get you some water.” Bones shoots him a dirty look when he finds the Brita filter in the fridge empty. “You do know what’s in the water around here, right?”

“Whatever, man.” Jim is sulking. He wants his Ramen back. By now the other three have wandered over (except Scotty, who should probably be in the hospital for alcohol poisoning for all he drank last night, but he’s managed to scrape by once again. There’s a rumor going around that his liver is actually made of steel.) and are looking rather perplexed.

Kyle’s got his hood up, his hands shoved in the pocket of his hoodie, and he’s looking rather miserable, while Sulu just looks extremely tired.

“Jim, who’s the guy acting like your mum?” Kyle asks, collapsing in the chair next to Jim.

“Kyle, meet Leonard McCoy. Who seems to indeed be an extension of my mother,” Jim grumbles as Bones starts going through the grocery bags. “Also, in case you want to hate him, which I fully support, he goes to Stanford.”

“Don’t be such an infant,” Bones bitches, whacking him in the head with a spoon. 

“Ow, you bitch! And I will be if I want to, you took my Ramen!”

Bones doesn’t even justify this with a response, and Jim supposes he should be grumpily thankful when lunch turns out to be amazing. At least one of them can cook.

\---

Bones spends his senior year frantically applying to every medical school possible. Jim just sort of looks bemused at the whole thing and fills out a few law school applications. He’s not worried.

Jim applies to Harvard Law as a joke. He gets Bones to apply to Johns Hopkins. Bones assures him (his eyebrows looking rather crazy the whole time) that there isn’t an ice cube’s chance in hell that he’s getting into Hopkins. According to him, no one gets into Hopkins. Ever. They make up numbers to say that people actually are accepted, but it’s a bunch of lies. Jim just rolls his eyes and kisses him, because they’ve only got the weekend together.

They figure they’ll end up staying on the west coast – maybe get into school in LA. What they don’t expect to happen is the East Coast.

\---

He pulls into the parking garage of Bones’ apartment building at exactly 1:09 in the morning. It’s cold out, and Jim had run out in sandals and a t-shirt because that seemed like the thing to do after he’d gotten Bones’ text just over an hour earlier.

_Got my acceptance to Hopkins._

It’s late enough that most of campus is already out partying, and there’s music reverberating through the walls as he gets off the elevator, running a hand through his hair and snapping his carabineer that carries his keys open and shut, over and over again.

When he gets to apartment 402 he knocks once and the door opens before he can knock again. M’Benga’s standing at the door, a six-pack tucked under his arm like a football, looking at him in confusion. Bones is just beyond him, stalled in pulling a hoodie on, his hands holding it halfway down his chest.

“Jim?” Bones breathes, and M’Benga just opens the door a little wider, leaving Jim standing in the door like a deer in the headlights, staring at Bones like he’s the only person in the universe. When he speaks, it’s directed right at Bones.

“I got into Harvard.” Jim mentally kicks himself – hello might have been better. A few emotions flash across Bones face before he settles back on ‘stoic’, and he motions Jim over. M’Benga makes himself scarce pretty quickly.

He doesn’t have to be told twice, he’s got Bones wrapped up in a hug in a few steps as M’Benga closes the door behind him, breathing into his shoulder. It doesn’t help that they’ve been so busy lately that it’s been almost two months since they’ve seen each other.

“Don’t you have an exam tomorrow morning?” Bones asks, tugging them towards his room and kicking the door shut behind them.

“Screw the exam,” Jim mumbles. “It’s for Russian Lit, totally unnecessary.” He lets Bones dump him on the bed before sitting down next to him.

“So you got into Harvard,” Bones says quietly after a moment.

“Yeah,” Jim breathes out, leaning against Bones’ shoulder. “We’re either the stupidest or smartest people ever.” Bones wraps his arms around Jim’s shoulders, tugging him closer.

“Intelligent, it would seem. Not smart.”

Jim laughs, rubbing at his face. “Nope, not very smart.” 

“So what do you want to do?”

“That doesn’t mater,” Jim murmurs. “I can go to law school anywhere. Every single one of the schools I applied to will get me into any major firm. That’s irrelevant. What is relevant is where you need to go to med school.”

“Jim, I know you tend to ignore your own needs, but –“

“I’m serious, Len.” And he is deadly so if he’s using Bones’ actual name. “You need to go to Hopkins. No one turns down Hopkins.”

“No one turns down Harvard, either. It’s the number one law school in the country.”

“Fun fact, that’s actually Yale. Harvard is number two.” Jim’s attempt at humor falls flat. “How far apart are Baltimore and Boston?”

“I don’t know,” Bones sighs. “8, 9 hours? Something like that. It could be worse.” 

“Yeah right.”

“It could be. It takes a lot longer to drive from coast to coast than through New England.” Jim snuggles closer against him at that, and they’re silent for a while.

“I got promised a spot at my dad’s firm if I go to Harvard.” 

“What branch?”

“I can get them to place me in the Manhattan office until you finish med school and figure out where you’re going to do your residency.”

“Jim – look. This is your life, don’t plan it around me.” Jim pulls back, confusion on his face.

“It’s not mine, it’s ours. Always has been. You know what happened the one time I tried to be totally selfish?” 

“What?”

“We got put in different fourth grade classes.” 

“Oh.”

“Yeah. And you got the better teacher, too.”

Jim snuggles back and Bones has to laugh at that.

“We are one pair of codependent fuck-ups,” Bones sighs, carding a hand through Jim’s hair. 

“Yeah, but we’re hot codependent fuck-ups who have each other.”

Bones can’t really argue with that.

“What time is your class tomorrow?” He asks finally

“11. I can leave at like 9:30 and still have time to get to class.” 

“Stay, then?”

“You don’t have to ask.” Jim looks up at him, totally open and honest.

They end up tangled together under the sheets, Jim’s shoes left by the side of the bed. Jim’s asleep almost instantly, an annoyingly unfair habit he’s had since he was a little kid, but it takes Bones longer to finally drift off.

He falls asleep thinking about how much it’s going to hurt not being able to see Jim nearly as much as he wants too. 

He ends up graduating at the top of his class, headed to the most prestigious medical school in the country, and yet when he sees Jim afterwards, leaning against a wall in a button up and slacks, having him there matters a whole lot more than the diploma in his hands does.

\---

“It’s too damn cold to be summer.” Bones curls up on himself a bit more and Jim rolls his eyes, shaking his head in amusement from where he’s leaning against the windshield, his legs splayed out on the hood. 

“There’s a blanket in the back, Miss Priss.” Jim motions in the vague direction of over his shoulder.

Bones shoots him a glare and sits up, slipping off the hood of the car. They’d come out to the beach because it seemed like the right thing to do – it’d be a long four years on the wrong coast before they’d be back on the Pacific again. Bones isn’t overly enthusiastic about the beach or anything, but there’s something magnetic about the ocean. The way it is now – cool and breezy – suits his mood.

The back of the Jeep is currently a total disaster. The back seats are folded up and Jim’s seemingly got half the contents of his apartment currently haphazardly piled in the back – his textbooks (including one that Bones knows for a fact he hasn’t touched since his sophomore year) that he should have sold back at the end of the year, a few study books for the LSAT, a box of flat packed IKEA furniture, several blankets, and, oddly enough, a guitar case. And a ceramic flower planter, but he’s not even going to speculate about that.

“Who’s the guitar belong to?” Bones calls as he wrestles a blanket out from under the box marked BESTÅ SIDE TABLE and tugs it around his shoulders, wearing it like a cape.

“Me,” Jim answers serenely, and Bones raises an eyebrow even though Jim can’t see him. “Actually, can you bring it up here?”

As far as Bones knows Jim doesn’t play any musical instrument, let alone the guitar, but he pops open the case anyway, pulling out the acoustic. It looks a few years old – it’s starting to wear in places – and the wood is a gorgeous blonde color that reminds Bones of Jim’s hair.

He hands the guitar to Jim before hefting himself back up onto the hood and burrowing in the blanket, watching Jim as he tucks the guitar under an arm and runs his fingers up the neck, like he’s done it a million times before. He starts to tune it as Bones watches, and he’s startled that Jim can pick the right pitch out of thin air. Bones has good pitch, he has to, but not like this – he’s almost willing to say Jim has perfect pitch.

“I wanted to surprise you,” Jim murmurs, still looking down at the guitar. When he finally looks up he’s smiling in a rather uncharacteristic way – he almost looks shy.

“You did anyway,” Bones assures him. “You can play?”

“I got Kyle to start teaching me when I was a freshman. It’s easy enough.” He picks a few notes out of nowhere, and Bones thinks they’re totally random until he recognizes the melody in them, and he closes his eyes, taking a deep breath. He’s heard this song a million times.

“Start at the beginning?” He asks, and Jim doesn’t have to question what he means, he just nods and starts over. It doesn’t have the same twanging country feel that the recording does, but it’s the same song, nonetheless. The way Jim plays is beautiful, and Bones wishes there was more of an intro to just listen to him play, but the first lines of the song pick up too quickly.  
It’s been a while since he’s done any singing outside the shower, and it feels almost odd to have someone listening again. 

“Here I am, where I’ve been-“ And yet, it’s so easy to fall back into. He watches Jim’s fingers dance across the frets and strings as he sings, and totally misses the emotions that flicker across Jim’s face. Jim hasn’t heard Bones sing in literally years, and his voice has mellowed. It’s less sharp around the edges, a little more raw at the back of his throat, and it makes Jim’s breath hitch. It’s gorgeous.

When the song fades away into the last few chords, they just sit in the silence for a minute, listening to the gentle rush of the waves before Bones pulls Jim in by the back of the neck, resting their foreheads together.

“We can do this.” It’s said to Jim as much as it is to himself.

\---

It was total dumb luck that M’Benga had ended up at Hopkins too – and it at least gave him someone easy to room with who he knew. They lived on campus the first year, and after that found a tiny apartment that worked for breakfast and sleeping and not much else, but that was ok, because neither of them were doing much eating or sleeping, and certainly not spending a whole lot of time outside various libraries and labs.

“It’s my mom’s 60th, my dad wants me home for the weekend.” Bones is dully aware that M’Benga is talking to him.

“Huh?” He looks up from where he’s sprawled on his bed, his eyes slightly blurry from staring at a textbook for so long. He was starting to really hate autoimmune disorders, and he blamed it totally on this book.

“I’m leaving this weekend, going back to Charleston. My mom’s turning 60,” he explains again. “You’re seriously out of it, aren’t you?”

“Evidently you can experience the symptoms of myasthenia gravis by reading about it for hours on end despite not actually having it.” Bones yawns, rubbing at his forehead. “I sure as hell have double vision and muscle weakness.”

“Which are symptoms of everything.” M’Benga grins at him. “Get some rest this weekend. I took the liberty of informing Jim I’d be gone.”

“You what?” Bones looks back up at him, looking shocked. Coupled with the fact that his left eyebrow was crawling up his forehead and he hadn’t shaved in a few days, he looked slightly crazed.

“Yeah, I sent him a text message yesterday telling him to haul ass down here for the weekend.” M’Benga shrugs.

“But, I have to study, I have this test-“

“You’re going to give yourself an ulcer.” M’Benga reaches out to nudge him with his foot. “Enjoy your weekend. Get some sleep. Or, as much as Jim will let you get.”

“I really hate that everyone knows about my sex life,” Bones grouses, glaring back down at the book. “I’m tempted to thank you, but I feel like it would damage my image.”

“Thank you accepted.” M’Benga smiles and pushes off his bed, straightening out his shirt. “Want me to order pizza?” Bones looks like he’s about to protest, but he finally just nods.

“Yeah, thanks. Pizza would rock.”

Sometimes he’s not sure what he’d do without M’Benga. It’s good one of them has their head on straight. 

\---

Bones is mostly asleep on Saturday morning, like any normal human being would be, when someone unlocks his door. He jolts upright, throws himself off the bed, and is in the process of finding the bat stored under his bed when a familiar head smiles over the edge.

“You look a bit startled there, Bones.” Jim rests his chin on his hand and his grin gets wider.

“What the fuck, assmunch!” He flails around a bit more until he can roll over onto his back and glare up at Jim. “I was asleep! It’s –“ he cranes his head to look at his clock, “- 7:12 in the morning!”

“So?” Jim offers him a hand, and pulls Bones back up into bed. He sits cross-legged, his frown turned up to eleven.

“So, normal people are asleep at that time on a Saturday morning. I don’t even want to think about how fucked your sleep patterns are at this point if you’re here at seven am.”

“Hey, I was awake at midnight, I thought I’d get started on my drive.” Jim shrugs. “You look rather sleep deprived yourself. I was instructed to make sure you get lots of sleep and not a lot of studying done this weekend.”

Bones sighs, rubbing sleep from his eyes. He can already feel his anger slipping away – he hasn’t seen Jim in months, he doesn’t have time to be annoyed with him. Even if just letting himself in unannounced to wake Bones up is kind of sucky.

“I have finals coming up,” Bones sighs. “They’re important, you know.”

“Yeah, and I have to take the Bar next month. Your point?” Jim smiles lazily at him, reaching out to tuck a strand of Bones’ hair behind his ear. “Your hair’s getting long again.”

“And now you’re worried about my hair,” Bones scoffs, shaking it out from behind his ears. He’ll admit that it’s getting a little bit on the long side, but it’s not like he’s worried about getting it cut any time soon. There are other things he’s got to worry about.

Jim rolls his eyes, reaching out to run both of his hands through Bones’ hair, messing it up.

“Aside from the mop that’s currently on your head, how have you been?” Jim murmurs as he scoots closer to Bones. Bones dips his head and smiles, one corner of his mouth quirking up.

“Busy. Fine. You?” 

“About the same.”

Bones lets his hands creep across the sheets, coming to rest on Jim’s knees, his thumbs rubbing circles into his jeans.

Bones looks up and Jim looks right back at him, and then Jim’s on him, in his lap, kissing Bones for all he’s worth. Bones gasps against him, a hand on his hip and one on the small of his back, pulling him closer.

“I take it-“ Jim doesn’t let him pull back for very long, pressing another searing kiss to his lips, “- we won’t be doing much sleeping?” 

“Hell no.” Jim pants against his mouth, licking along Bones’ bottom lip.

“I think I’m ok with that.” 

“Sounds like a plan.”

\---

Jim’s pretty sure he’s dreaming. He has to be. There is no other excuse for why Bones is standing in the kitchen making breakfast, wearing a tight tank top and boxers. Jim grins stupidly, tilting his head to the side and just staring at the expanse of muscled back before letting his gaze just rest on Bones’ rather fantastic ass. 

“I’m dreaming,” Jim says happily. Bones looks over his shoulder and scowls as Jim slips out of bed to pad over.

“Did you bump your fucking head?” Bones bitches. “And get the hell out of my kitchen, you’re naked.”

“No way, I’ll help,” Jim says happily. He moves to get plates out of the cupboards, and totally misses it when Bones grabs a spatula out of the holder by the stove and whacks Jim with it, squarely on the ass. Jim actually yelps, and turns to Bones, looking rather flustered.

“What was-“

“Out. Now.” Bones points with the spatula. “If you want to come back, put some pants on.”

Jim wanders out in a daze. This is going to be an awesome weekend. Fuck the fact that he should be worried about the fact that he’s going to be a lawyer in a few short months (well, assuming he passes the Bar, which he will), he is totally ok to just do nothing but eat and fuck this whole weekend. He’s totally sending M’Benga a fruit basket. 

He’s spread eagle on Bones’ bed, smiling happily at the ceiling, when Bones appears with a strawberry and a grin. 

“Open up,” Bones says, and Jim complies, levering himself up on his elbows and making sure to eat the strawberry as obscenely as possible, licking any traces of it off of Bones’ fingers before leaning in to kiss Bones.

“Just so you know, you’re staying with me over winter break this year so that we can do this for like a whole week,” Jim murmurs against Bones’ lips.

“My mom might not enjoy you kidnapping me for Christmas.” Bones grins, and he lets Jim roll them over so that he’s straddling Bones, kissing around the neck of the tank top.

“She can deal with it. She’s got my number if she needs to yell at me.” Jim slips his hand under Bones’ shirt, smiling down at him. “Nothing burning in the kitchen?”

“I took it off the stove, dumbass.” Bones reaches up to pull Jim down so that he can kiss him. “Might get cold, though. And are you serious?”

“About what?” Jim mumbles, tracing Bones’ bottom lip with his tongue.

“Spending the holidays with you in- where are you going to be?” Jim leans back far enough to sit on Bones’ lap, pulling Bones up with him.

“I am very serious about that. I’ll be in New York, I just got the ok last week.” 

“Christmas in Manhattan. Sounds like-“

“-totally romantic?”

“I was going to say dirty and gross and cold, but sure.” Bones laughs when Jim rolls his eyes. “Yes, I’ll come up to Manhattan for the holidays. I think I know a high powered attorney I can stay with.”

“Do you now?” Jim waggles his eyebrows. “Is he totally gorgeous and amazing and rich?”

“I am not feeding your ego.” Bones grins against Jim’s mouth when he kisses him again. “But yes, he is.”

“I know a doctor who’s the same way,” Jim murmurs, and Bones runs his hands up Jim’s side, his grin splitting into a smile. They keep trading lazy kisses until Jim rolls them back over, and then Bones’ clothes end up on the floor and breakfast does indeed get cold.

\---

The last time Jim proposes to Bones, it finally sticks.

It’s cold, they’ve got their chins dipped into collars and scarves, and they’re both nursing coffees that are steaming in the chilly air. They’re walking quickly, eager to get out of the cold, even though they know at the back of their minds that a Subway station won’t be much better.

They’d walked far enough south from the park that (unfortunately) Times Square is the closest station, and Jim groans, but goes for it anyway, because it’s fucking freezing out here.

“I hate this place,” Jim grouses as they squeeze past little families on winter vacation, Jim working one of his gloves off with his teeth so that he can dig in his jacket pocket for his Metrocard.

“It might be the stupidest place on Earth,” Bones grumbles in agreement, slipping through the turnstile next to Jim. They make their way through the sea of people, moving along with the business people who are moving at a faster clip that the tourists.

Jim leads the way around corners and down stairs, knowing which way he has to go pretty much by memory.

They’re standing on the platform, waiting for a southbound train, when Jim sighs, and Bones looks over at him with a raised eyebrow, taking a sip of his coffee.

“Look,” Jim starts, messing with the end of his scarf. “I don’t have a ring this time, but when this whole mess of being apart is over, you want one?”

Bones, to his credit, doesn’t look shocked or annoyed. Jim feels like the rest of the world fades into the background, and he finds it fitting that evidently the way to get Manhattan to shut the hell up is to propose to your boyfriend in a sea of people on a Subway platform.

“For real this time? No daisy chains and Barbie rings?” There’s a smile spreading across Bones’ face – not his usual smirk, but a wide, honest to god smile.

“No daisy chains or Barbie rings.” Jim laughs, shaking his head. He feels a bit of tension slip out of his shoulders when Bones reaches out to give his hand a squeeze.

“Yeah, I’d like one,” he murmurs, and Jim takes a deep breath in, squeezing back, and smiles as a train comes rocketing into the station and the noise of the city returns.


End file.
